Zubik v. Burwell

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Attorneys for the conservative Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration on behalf of the Roman Catholic Dioceses in Erie and Pittsburgh and their affiliate organizations challenging the birth control benefit. The birth control benefit is the provision in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that requires certain providers of group health insurance plans to cover contraception without charging a co-pay.

Specifically, plaintiffs allege that the process established by the Obama administration for accommodating religious objections to the birth control benefit in the ACA violates their religious exercise under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). The accommodation permits religious nonprofits to self-certify their eligibility for an exemption from the birth control benefit by notifying either their insurance company or the federal government that they object to contraceptive coverage on religious grounds.

Plaintiffs allege that this self-certification process violates their religious rights because it “triggers” the provision of contraceptive coverage to which they object on religious grounds. They further allege that the paperwork the government requires them to fill out that states their eligibility for a religious exemption from the birth control benefit is, in and of itself, an infringement on their religious freedom in violation of RFRA.

STATUS

On November 21, 2013, the district court granted plaintiffs a preliminary injunction that it then converted into a permanent injunction in August 2014. The government appealed to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, which consolidated the case with Geneva College v. Burwell, another case involving similar claims.

On February 11, 2015, a three-judge panel of the Third Circuit reversed the district court’s ruling, reasoning that the accommodation does not impose a substantial burden on plaintiffs’ religious freedom.